The mania of the Castillos

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Monthly Archives: November 2015

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We really did up Christmas last year, trying out many Seattle-area events. We rode a train to see Santa, we went to see there big train set at Westlake, we visited a hotel room decked out with hundreds of teddy bears, and more. At the end of it, we were all pretty tired and we agreed that the best event, by far, is the gingerbread house workshop in Bellevue.

The gingerbread houses are ready to go when we arrive, and we got to pick out all there candy we want from their candy buffet tables. We always have a great time decorating the house together. It’s the perfect Sam activity because it is creative.

This year’s house features a couple of snakes. One is crawling up the wall, and another is slithering around the front yard.

I signed Sam up for a pretzel and cheese making class months ago. He was so excited about it that he came home with this poster full of sentences that his classmates wrote about him in September:

I don’t think he had ever had pretzels with cheese at that time. After weeks of waiting, he finally got to attend the class and learn how to make pretzels. Some good friends joined us, and the boys had a great time making baked apples, kneading dough, shaping pretzels, and eating.

The teachers of these classes make this a really fun experience for kids. Kids are encouraged to do everything themselves, and there is no wrong way to do anything. Once Sam had formed his pretzels, he asked the teacher what would happen if he put them all really close together on the baking sheet. She told him that they would bake together into one giant pretzel and asked if that was what he wanted. He decided to make one big pretzel and was very proud of the result, especially after the teacher told him that his pretzel looked like a tie fighter from Star Wars.

I’ve been meaning to share some pictures from Halloween for a long time.

Sam drew his Jack-o-lantern design on a piece of paper, and Dave carved it into the pumpkin for him. I like how it turned out.

Dave set up this awesome display in front of our house. We saw many trick or treaters stop to take pictures beside it.
We met up with a group of kids from our neighborhood to trick or treat. It was pouring down rain, but the kids had a blast running from house to house.

Finally, here are some pictures of Sam’s electric dragon costume. It was a special costume because we worked on it together.